Celtic eye chance against injury-stricken AC Milan

Celtic’s Champions League opponents Milan, whom Neil Lennon’s side face in the
Group H opener at the Stadio Giuseppe Meazza on Wednesday night, will go
into the tie with an ever-increasing queue for the treatment room at their
training complex.

Confident: Mikael Lustig believes that they can survive their Champons League group of deathPhoto: GRAHAM STUART

Club captain and playmaker Riccardo Montolivo and newly-returned Brazilian forward Kaka have been ruled out due to hamstring problems while Italy defenders Ignazio Abate, Mattia De Sciglio and Daniele Bonera will also be missing as a result of injury, while Argentine centre-back Matías Silvestre is also in the “doubtful” category.

Italy strikers Stephan El Shaarawy and Giampaolo Pazzini are also unavailable. That leaves coach Massimiliano Allegri, whose tenure has been the subject of severe criticism from supporters and reporters alike, short of options, particularly at the back, as he attempts to help the club regain the trophy they last won by beating Liverpool in 2007.

Slovenia winger Valter Birsa, who made his debut for the Rossoneri as a substitute for Kaka as they came back from two goals down to draw away to Torino on Saturday, has no doubt that Neil Lennon’s players will pose a viable threat.

“It will be an intense match against Celtic and we have to win to bring home the points and hope that everything goes well,” he told the Milan website.

[Replacing] someone like Kaka is good for your morale. There are many champions here. The coach will make his choices and he will do it for the good of Milan.

“Celtic are a physical team, very fast and with high balls they can hurt you. We must fight for the championship and we need to remain in the leading group to do well.

“The environment at Milan is completely different than the other teams. There is quality in everything."

The Scottish champions are also quietly confident that they can emulate last season’s achievement of progressing from a competitive group to reach the last 16 of the tournament.

Swedish full-back Mikael Lustig certainly believes that they can remain in the premier competition after Christmas for the third time in eight seasons.

“Last year, when we looked at the group [Barcelona, Benfica and Spartak Moscow], no one believed in us,” he said.

"We knew it was going to be really tough but there was only one game we didn't feel we played really well - Benfica away - but still we were really close to getting a point.

"We won at Spartak and we were really close to taking points at the Nou Camp as well so of course our confidence is maybe better than it was last year. It's going to be really hard but we have faith.”

Lustig dismissed any suggestion that Celtic may go into Wednesday’s tie with an inferiority complex.

“Of course we are underdogs like last year but there are going to be some massive games, especially when we are playing at Celtic Park,” he said. “We know we can beat any team there.

"Last year was the same. We are not going to be happy to play some decent football but go back to Glasgow with zero points."

Celtic have lost the spine of last season’s campaigners due to the summer sales of Kelvin Wilson, Victor Wanyama and Gary Hooper but Lustig refuses to accept that Celtic have been weakened by their absence.

"We lost three good players but I think we have a better squad this season overall," he said.